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Psalms for Everyone - Keep It Simple
Psalms for Everyone - Keep It Simple
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Keep It Simple Psalm 50 It’s kind of complicated being a church. It was brought home to me yesterday when for the first time I took the bunch of church keys that I recently inherited to go for a meeting with a couple whose baby we are going to baptize. There are fifteen keys. I n…
John for Everyone Part 1 - The Snake and the Love of God
John for Everyone Part 1 - The Snake and the Love of God
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Snake and the Love of God John 3.14-21 ‘And mind you watch out for snakes!’ My wife gave me a final warning before I set off into the hills. The footpaths had been closed for several months because of a widespread and infectious animal disease. Many creatures that normally ke…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Second Sunday Before Lent Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Second Sunday Before Lent Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Second Sunday Before Lent Proverbs 8.1, 22–31 Colossians 1.15–20 John 1.1–14 The Sunday lectionary readings do, on the whole, allow us to focus on the central Christian belief that God does all things out of love towards his creation. Even when the readings focus on the suffe…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The First Sunday of Lent Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The First Sunday of Lent Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The First Sunday of Lent Genesis 9.8–17 1 Peter 3.18–22 Mark 1.9–15 When God makes his covenant with creation after the flood, it is a covenant not just with Noah and his family, or even with all future human beings, but with ‘every living creature that is with you’ (v. 10). What…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Proper 1 Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Proper 1 Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Proper 1 Isaiah 40.21–31 1 Corinthians 9.16–23 Mark 1.29–39 There are two complicated, separate yet related themes running through today’s readings. The first is to do with proclamation – all three passages talk about the ways in which God makes himself known to us. The second is…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Fourth Sunday of Lent Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Fourth Sunday of Lent Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Fourth Sunday of Lent Numbers 21.4-9 Ephesians 2.1–10 John 3.14–21 The imagination nourished by the Bible immediately springs into action at the mention of snakes. In Numbers, they may be real rather than metaphorical, but that does not prevent them from carrying heavy symbol…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Fifth Sunday of Lent Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Fifth Sunday of Lent Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Fifth Sunday of Lent Jeremiah 31.31–34 Hebrews 5.5–10 John 12.20–33 At last a nice easy covenant. At last, Jeremiah seems to be suggesting, God will give up trying to teach us things and just zap us, changing us so that it becomes natural to us to know God. We won’t need to b…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 1 Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 1 Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 1 Mark 1.29-39 Contemplate a solitary place where you can best pray. Where would you choose? Perhaps the sea shore, where you can hear God speak in the roar of the waves; or a wood where you hear him whisper in the rustle of the leaves; a garden, where you see his hope i…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 2 Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 2 Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 2 Mark 1.40-45 Gaze on this man, whom we know nothing about, except that he is a leper. We don’t know whether he’s old or young, rich or poor. Once someone was labelled ‘leper’, that was all that was important, and their individual identity was lost. His body and limbs a…
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - The Fifth Sunday of Lent Year B
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - The Fifth Sunday of Lent Year B
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Fifth Sunday of Lent (Passiontide begins) Jeremiah 31.31–34 Hebrews 5.5–10 John 12.20–33 Imagine the simple request echoing along the corridors of church bureaucracy. It is passed from office to office, from secretary to secretary. It is left on voice-mails and e-mails, faxed…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Third Sunday of Lent Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Third Sunday of Lent Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
The Third Sunday of Lent John 2.13-22 Gaze on all that remains of the Temple in Jerusalem. Once a massive edifice with columns of white marble and gates of silver and gold, Herod’s monument was destroyed by the Romans, much as Jesus had predicted. But a fragment remains, which is…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Fifth Sunday of Lent Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Fifth Sunday of Lent Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
The Fifth Sunday of Lent John 12.20-30 Gaze on the ways we glorify people in this world. We plaster their faces over our newspapers and report on their every word and their every move. We glorify them with huge salaries and a trail of photographers who follow their every action. …
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Fourth Sunday of Lent Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Fourth Sunday of Lent Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
The Fourth Sunday of Lent John 3.14-21 Gaze on a dark cellar. You have been trapped inside for ages. It is pitch black in there and there is no switch or bulb hanging overhead to light up your prison. You stumble about feeling the walls, desperate to find a door, or some way out …
Revelation for Everyone - Babylon the Great
Revelation for Everyone - Babylon the Great
by SPCK - N T Wright
Babylon the Great Revelation 17.1-8 They are brought in vans, they are brought in cars with blackened windows, they are brought across the sea, either captured by force or lured with the promise of a better life. They arrive in countries of the West, knowing no one except their c…
John for Everyone Part 1 - Before Abraham, "I Am"
John for Everyone Part 1 - Before Abraham, "I Am"
by SPCK - N T Wright
Before Abraham, “I Am” John 8.48-59 Abraham lived roughly as long before Jesus as Jesus did before us. Speaking of them as in any sense contemporaries conjures up images of time travel, such as has been made famous in the world of science fiction since at least H. G. Wells and Ju…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 3 Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 3 Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 3 Mark 2.1-12 Gaze on the man lying on the stretcher. He is beyond taking any action on his own behalf. He is so paralysed and weak that he has lost all control over his choices. Gaze on his stiff and useless limbs. Gaze on the hope deep in his eyes. Perhaps he has been …
Revelation for Everyone - A Dragon is Angry
Revelation for Everyone - A Dragon is Angry
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Dragon Is Angry Revelation 12.7-18 A happy argument took place in the changing-room after the end of the match. Who had scored the winning goal? There had been a big scramble in the goalmouth; the ball was bouncing to and fro; two of the attacking players had both swung a foo…
Mark for Everyone - A Lamp on Its Stand